You
are at the start of one of the longest Blog Hops ever done – around the World.

Make
sure you complete the list – become a follower, like us on FB & leave a
comment – hope you have fun & Good Luck

We are circling the globe this weekend.We start in the Adelaide Hills at Meg’s
Garden in Hahndorf, South Australia & then head down the hill to Adelaide
to visit Adriana, Heather, Chantal & Denise. We then hop almost all the way
across Australia to Perth, Western Australia to Jen.After a long hop across the ocean to South
Africa we visit Evgenia. Then North to
Sylvie in France, Ulrika in Sweden, & Elena in Belarus. Another long hop across another ocean to
Canada where we pop in to Stephanie & Vicky.Back downunder again to Sandrine in Queensland,
Shell in Victoria, then to Victor Harbor to blog at Gayle’s in South Australia
& then up the hill back to Meg’s Garden. Pheww!!

How many time zones was that??

Each blog hop will have an Eye Candy especially
chosen by that blogger from Meg’s Garden! - value approx $15

These are shown belowand also on that Design Team member’s blog.

Meg’s Garden is also giving away one goodies
package to one lucky winner chosen from those who survived the oceans, desert
& maybe some snow!

What will
it be??Posting at the bottom of this blog after the fabulous Eye Candies.

All you
have to do is become a follower of the Meg’s Garden Blog and “like us” on
Facebook, as well as visit each participating blog, become of follower of those
blogs and leave a comment.

A Vintage Beauties Pack of goodies - 8 different 4x12" strips of Vintage Beauties (Meg's Garden is well known for vintage images & products), asst ribbons, pack of pearls & spacers, lace, german scrap corners or flourishes (depending on how you use them), petals in assorted pinks & white to make your own flowers & a strip of silver diamante trim.

These prizes will have some happy smiles after such hard work
But I hope you had fun & met lots of fantastic bloggers along the way

29 November, 2012

Hi
Three more Christmas cards from Denise Ann with totally different papers & themes.

Denise always uses the papers she designs for us in her projects & here she uses A Berry Merry Christmas from 'A Musical Christmas Collection' using tones of green. This paper is so simple & really elegant that all it needs is some highlighting, fussy cutting & some sparkled die cut flourishes & snow flakes. The folded piece on the front of the card is an extremely unusual & very elegant touch. A ribbon in red completes this beautiful card.

The second card uses Plum Pudding, A Silent Night & Noel Noel (all 3 from 'A Musical Christmas Collection') papers & is a tri-fold easel card with a wrap around piece that slides off to showcase the really beautiful card inside. The slider has its own banner, fussy cut flourish with sparkle, die cut & sparkled words.

Inside the tri-fold card you can see the papers of each of the folds along with embellishing with die cut flourishes; another paper is on the easel which is embellished with a burgundy paper flowers & sparkled die cut snow flakes & flourishes

The 3rd card is also a tri-fold card using Silent Night paper with a fabulous sparkled die cut attached to the back of the front of the card which is embellished with more snowflakes & Noel word.

Three absolutely fabulous pieces of art from the Card Queen. Well done Denise!!

26 November, 2012

This week our focus is on Christmas & we have some fabulous projects for you.

These canvases are from Sandrine & she explains her projects:

'Hello!
I am very happy to share with you my very first project for Meg's Garden! I am
using one of my favourite Xmas paper "Red & Cream Lace" out of
The Vintage Christmas Collection , it has a traditional colour combo of red,
beige and gold!
It also has gorgeous flourishes through it!
Every year I try to create little decorations to scatter around the house to
decorate and make it feel like Christmas. And yes! every year I dress up the
kids for a photo shoot, I do not have to force them they love dressing up and
they actually have lots of fun too! The 2 photos I chose for my mini canvases
are from last year but they are so cute and I haven't had a chance for a photo
shoot yet this year.

What attracted me to this paper was the colours and the gorgeous
flourishes so ideal for fussy cutting!

After knowing the colour
combo I was playing with for my project, I went through my own supplies for
paints, inks and matching cardstock. I like to organise a little before I start
any kind of work. I first painted my canvases with some cream acrylic paint. I
then proceeded with working with the gorgeous chipboard frames also available
from Meg's Garden. Distress Ink Pad "Fired Brick" is the perfect
match for the paper, after covering each frame with ink I added a coat of
Crackle paint in "Rock Candy" it gave the frames a luscious red
crackle effect! Perfect for the festive feel I wanted to create. I used the border
around the paper to cut 2 rosettes. I then added some gold glitter in the
centre of each rosette. Those canvases have loads of layers and mounting foam
to give lots of dimension. I chose a giant banner as the bottom layer of my
canvases as it is so trendy at the moment! I added some stamped words and
punched circles around the canvas for balance and also some cut out
flourishes/branches out of the paper. For a little bit more detail I added some
inked German Scrap and a little gold bell hanging off a bit of rope. Meg has an
amazing array of products it was so so fun to play!

Have a lovely week-end!'Well done Sandrine - love the choice of colours & embellishing; also LOOOVEEE the banners & the fussy cut flourishes. Thank you so much for your Christmas ideas.Bye for nowMegwww.megsgarden.comPS Don't forget the BLOG HOP on Friday starting at 5pm our time

23 November, 2012

Stephanie describes her inspiration & procedures for this beautiful LO: 'As
soon as I saw this “Green Toile” paper from Meg’s Garden I knew it would be
perfect for this photo of my grandson that I took in a small Japanese garden at
one of the parks where they live. I felt that the dark pink flowers in the
photo brought out the bits of pink in the paper. I was telling my grandson he
looked like a movie star trying to hide out from his fans with the sun glasses
he was wearing…hence the title for this layout.

I
love doing fussy cutting on my layouts and these beautiful papers just scream
“fussy cutting” to me. So I cut out the matching flowers from the 4” x 12”
strip to pop up with foam down on the matching flowers on the right side of the
paper. To frame my photo I took one of the pretty square doily papers (bond25)
that Meg has and cut two of the laced corners off and then laid them together
to make a square diamond shape and then placed my photo down on top

For
my flower cluster I used the 3 layer white Gardenias and the pink/cream open
paper roses from Meg’s Garden.I decided
to try to mimic the white flowers in the paper and using some of my yellow
scrapping chalk I used a q-tip and colored the center and stamens of the white
gardenias yellow. The tiny pink and yellow rosebuds I made – you can find the
tutorial to make the rosebuds on my blog here: http://scrappers-heavencanada.blogspot.ca/2012/10/rosebud-tutorial.html

Small
pieces of coordinating paper to use behind torn and folded back corner

Foam
pop dots, Double
sided tape'

Beautiful layout Stephanie - well done. Love the embellishing & thank you so much for the link to the tutorial for the rosebuds. It is always fabulous to have your own unique touch to a project & the store does not always have the prfect colour you need. Love the tip for colouring the stamens of the flowers. You have also shown us that you can use flowers, lace & flourishes with a male photo & have it work.

From Wikipedia:‘Phileas
Foggis
the main fictional characterin the 1873 Jules Verne novel ‘Around the World in Eighty
Days’.

Fogg attempts to circumnavigate the late Victorianworld in eighty days, or less, for a
wagerof £20,000 with members of
London’s Reform Club. He takes
the wager and leaves with Passepartout, vowing to return by 8:45 pm on
Saturday 21 December 1872. Under suspicion of robbing the Bank of England,he is followed by a detective named Fix. Fogg
has no idea about Fix's true intentions and Fix (wanting to get Fogg back to
England so that he can arrest him) works with Fogg in the last half of the
book.

While in India he saves a widowed
princess, named Aouda from Suttee during
her husband's funeral. Passepartout rescues her and she accompanies Fogg for
the rest of his journey. She and Fogg eventually fall in love and marry at the
end of the book. Fix, who is really supposed to arrest Fogg, attempts to
sabotage him by putting him in prison near the end of the book but he is
quickly released. Fogg, who has been careful to keep track of every day in his
diary, believes that he arrives home on Sunday and that he has lost his bet.
However, he discovers, almost too late, that he has forgotten to adjust his timekeeping
for having crossed the International Date Line and he wins his bet after all.’

Phileas
Fogg had 80 days to circle the globe - we are allowing 4 days only! But we have
an advantage over his modes of travel

– he had to catch trains, ride an
elephant, an air balloon & more....

Make
sure you complete the list – become a follower, like us on FB & leave a
comment – at each blog.

Start here at 5pm on 30th November for the route & the final prize

We are taking into account the International Date Line & Time Zones for you so you do not have to worry that you will miss out like Phileas almost did.

"Tea staining has been around a long time and was first used to hide stains on linens. Tea staining is an easy way to create an "antique" or primitive look. The differences between tea staining & coffee staining are subtle. Tea is lighter and gives a more 'dirty' look. Coffee seems browner and give a more 'old' look. Just be aware that coffee is much more aromatic than tea, and your finished item will smell like coffee for a long time to come. We have found that some fabrics (or paper) look better tea stained and some look better coffee stained. We have tea stained & coffee stained with both brewed and instant, both gave satisfactory results, I just find instant easier, but there is not near as much color selection. Earl Grey is usually the tea of choice, but English breakfast is ok, too. Check out your grocery store or specialty shops and buy black tea for a gentle, soft brown, antique look. "from http://www.primitive-beginnings.com

17 November, 2012

They are the perfect Christmas presents for your papercrafting friends & family.

Denise Ann has momentarily taken a break from designing on paper & has taken her talents to fabric.

The apron is done on black cotton twill (more practical than the beige she had in mind at the beginning) & measures 70x86cm

This is the awesome design which measures 21x28cm

I can see so many options to embellish it - definitely some silver diamante pieces for the centre of the flowers, some pearl flourishes & ribbons. Lace is an essential at the bottom of the apron - either a black frill or a cream with a pink or green ribbon insert.

The accompanying bag is calico & measures 38x41cm with the same 21x28cm design